Updating Mail Exchange (MX) Records for WordPress

by Vipe Team in WordPress Development; Published on 03.08.2021

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Despite the rise of Web 2.0 and beyond, e-commerce and online services continue to use email for many purposes, such as reaching out to customers or even employees. With that in mind, it makes perfect sense to migrate from an aging or inefficient email service provider to some of the newer solutions such as Google Workspace. Once you’ve made up your mind, you can sign up to one of these, but there’s one more thing that’ll need to be done – changing MX (Mail Exchange) Records.

Now if you just went “huh”, let us clarify – MX Records are one of the components of what we call DNS (or the Domain Name System), and they take care of routing email messages to the right destinations on the internet. While this process can seem a little complicated to the uninitiated, Vipe Studio is the WordPress agency for development that’s about to make it simple for you!

Why Should MX Records Be Updated

In most cases, these records work silently behind the scenes, just like DNS, and you won’t need to worry about them. However, if you’re about to switch to a new email provider or you’re trying to redirect your mail to a different server, we’ll have to go backstage and get familiar with these records.

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So, assuming you’re in one of these two situations, let’s try and understand how the MX records can be updated with zero hassle.

Updating MX Records (using the example of Domain.com)

We’re spoilt for choice when it comes to picking a hosting or email provider or domain registrar, and so the market is quite diverse, which of course means that the procedure to update MX records can differ from provider to provider.

For the purposes of this tutorial, therefore, we’ll be using Domain.com (a very popular domain registrar) as an example. The process should roughly be the same for all other alternatives. However, before you begin, keep in mind that once MX records are changed, you might face some email issues for up to the next 48 hours, as this is the time it could take for your changes to come into effect. This is the procedure:

1. Pick a Domain Name

Once you log in to Domain.com, you’ll see ‘DNS and Nameservers’ in the menu to the left. Be sure to select the right domain if you have more than one in the list.

2. Update the MX Record

Scroll to locate the MX Records pertaining to your selected domain – the “MX” mark should help you identify them. For the first record, select ‘more options’ in the 3-dot menu, and then ‘Edit’.

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On the next popup window, you can type or paste in the new MX Records in ‘Content’. Fill the remaining fields as well.

3. Save and Update DNS

Once everything has been entered, click ‘Update DNS’ and repeat from Step 1 for all other MX records you might have.

Concluding and Troubleshooting

While it is perfectly normal to face sending or receiving errors for the next 48 hours, you should definitely contact the web host if the problems persist beyond that period.

Like we said before, and as your WordPress agency for development would confirm, it would be best to pick some kind of downtime, like a weekend or holidays, to perform this process, so that no important emails have to take the hit when you change MX records.

For any other doubts regarding the process, feel free to drop a comment below, or contact our team. We’ll be back next time with more amazing tips and guides from the world of WordPress!